HOSPITALS: Tri-City sues Scripps over patient shift

OCEANSIDE -- Tri-City Medical Center sued Scripps Health Inc. on
Tuesday, alleging the giant hospital system has illegally poached
Tri-City patients and is risking their health by forcing them to go
to distant Scripps-run facilities.

The suit, which seeks a restraining order, also names Sharp
Mission Park Medical Group, a North County medical provider whose
doctors previously practiced at Tri-City. In 2008, Scripps
purchased the medical group and the 64 doctors who worked there
agreed to start using Scripps hospitals.

Attorney Daniel Callahan, an Orange County trial attorney who is
representing Tri-City in the lawsuit, said Tuesday the case is
about what's best for patients who live in the health-care
district.

"This is not about money," Callahan said. "This is about the
residents of the Tri-City area being denied good reliable prompt
medical care."

"I think it's an unprecedented attack of one hospital system on
another," Eastman said.

Since the Sharp Mission Park deal took effect in January, the
number of surgeries at Tri-City has dropped 30 percent, according
hospital reports, Tri-City is on pace to finish the fiscal year
with an $8 million deficit, in part because of the loss of
patients, officials have said.

In the lawsuit, Tri-City accuses Scripps of forcing nonemergency
patients to have surgeries and other medical procedures at Scripps
facilities and says Scripps has made "false representations to
patients and members of the public, that they must receive care and
treatment from Scripps and no other medical facility, including
Tri-City."Â

It also accuses Scripps of unlawful restraint of trade.

The lawsuit asks the court to bar Scripps from directing
patients who live within the Tri-City district to Scripps
hospitals. The Scripps hospital closest to Tri-City is Scripps
Encinitas, about 20 miles south.

Eastman said that, while Scripps doctors do state their
preference to refer patients to a Scripps hospital, they do not
insist.

"I'm aware of multiple cases where that is the case, where
patients have chosen to go to Tri-City," Eastman said. "Scripps
does not require, nor can they require, ultimately where those
patients go."

The lawsuit alleges that some Scripps patients who pass through
the doors of the Tri-City Emergency Department are inappropriately
transferred to Scripps hospitals in Encinitas or La Jolla after
they are stabilized. The lawsuit cites one case in which an unnamed
patient allegedly died after arriving at Scripps from Tri-City.

Callahan, Tri-City's attorney, said the patient might have
survived had he or she not been transferred. He declined to say how
the hospital learned of the patient's death, given that federal
privacy law prohibits sharing identifiable details of medical
records.

"This is a situation that has gone grossly out of control and it
is because Scripps is trying to increase market share and thus
profitability," Callahan said.

Eastman, Scripps' medical director, said his organization was
approached by doctors in the Sharp medical group about joining
Scripps. He noted that the normal emergency medical system
automatically directs patients with severe problems to the nearest
hospital for treatment.

Sharp Mission Park, now called Scripps Coastal Medical Center,
is in a large office building just east of Tri-City that contains
an urgent care facility. Eastman said that since Jan. 1, 20 to 30
percent of patients seen there were sent to Tri-City because their
conditions required immediate treatment.

"I think those physicians are absolutely adhering to the
Hippocratic oath and doing what's in the best interests of their
patients," Eastman said.